The So CA Tri-Counties Branch of IDA is a volunteer organization that services Orange, Riverside, and San Bernardino Counties; parts of East San Gabriel Valley, and Southern Nevada.

The MISSION of TCB is to bring researchers and relevant literacy topics to the public and to share information regarding literacy, including dyslexia, via media, personal contact, and events focused on literacy.

We ENVISION building a community that facilitates literacy success through appropriate recognition, understanding, & strategy implementation appropriate to dyslexia and other language-based learning differences. Populations served include educators, parents, individuals with dyslexia, and those who share their lives.

We believe that all individuals have the right to achieve their potential, individual learning abilities can be strengthened, and social, educational and cultural barriers to language acquisition and use must be removed.

Welcome

In 1887, Dr. Rudolf Berlin, an ophthalmologist, coined the word “dyslexia” to describe adults who could not read the printed word, yet had no visual abnormalities. He assumed, correctly, that the cause of this “word blindness” must be within the brain.

In the 1920’s, Dr. Samuel T. Orton studied children with reading and language processing difficulties. He determined that their difficulties must lie within the brain. He worked to formulate a set of principles for teaching such children. Anna Gillingham, a gifted educator and psychologist, was a master of language and began working with Dr. Orton to help him develop instructional materials and strategies. Thus began the Orton-Gillingham method, still considered the gold standard for teaching reading.

Fast forward to 2019. It has been 132 years since the word dyslexia entered our language. In those intervening years the debate has raged as to the cause and cure for dyslexia. The debate is now over! Thanks to fMRI combined with scientific investigation of methods for teaching reading, we know unequivocally that dyslexia is of a brain-based, neurological origin, and most importantly, we know how to teach children with dyslexia to read.

Imagine a classroom where every child is successful and every child can read. This is the goal of the International Dyslexia Association. IDA has been in the forefront of scientific research to discover and promote development of the most effective method for teaching children to read.

IDA has determined that to achieve this vision of a classroom where every child reads, we must educate the TEACHERS. In this new century, the focus of IDA is to become part of every university that has an education strand and to provide curriculum and accreditation so that every teacher knows the structure of language and effective reading instruction.

IDA is promoting a method of instruction, coined “Structured Literacy”* which is even now being introduced and used in several universities. This approach not only benefits children who struggle with learning to read, but it is so fundamental and natural that every child can excel. By donating to and being a member of IDA you enable and support achieving the reality of our goal and our vision of EVERY CHILD READING. All IDA members living in our Tri-Counties Service Area are also a member of our Tri-Counties Branch.

We welcome your comments and questions and look forward to meeting you at our events.

Dyslexia: The World the Way I See It

More than one in ten children in the US struggle with dyslexia or other language based learning difference. Without appropriate intervention, struggling readers have a higher probability of not completing high school. Their dreams are dashed. Their opportunities are diminished. It doesn’t have to be this way.